


tell me something true

by firstaudrina



Category: Gossip Girl
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Inspired by Drive Me Crazy, Inspired by Selfie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-30
Updated: 2015-06-30
Packaged: 2019-01-10 20:39:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12307314
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firstaudrina/pseuds/firstaudrina
Summary: It was simple, really: Blair would take Dan from pariah to belle of the ball (she'd done much more with much less in the past), and he would make her…socially pleasant to be around and more considerate of others.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is 50% _Selfie_ , 50% _Drive Me Crazy_ , 100% idiots.

"This is not going to work," Dan says.

Monday morning finds Dan and Blair standing side by side at the base of the school steps, twin looks of determination on their faces. For the first time in his life, Dan has had his uniform pressed. He has a haircut. He's carrying a new leather bag with his initials stamped in it: DJH.

"It's going to work," Blair says in a way that leaves no room for disagreement. "I paid for that haircut, it's going to work."

Dan sighs a little. He sticks out his hand. "Now or never."

Blair's nose wrinkles in distaste but she closes her fingers around his. "It'll work," she says again. "I just hope I don't regret it."

Dan has already started up the stairs, tugging her along. "One way to find out."

 

 

 

 

 

 

For that to make sense, one would first have to know this: in a very short time, Blair's life went spectacularly to pieces.

Her best friend disappeared off the face of the earth, she found out her boyfriend cheated on her with said best friend, she cheated on her boyfriend with _his_ best friend, her dad moved halfway across the world, and after a much too public pregnancy scare she was the laughingstock of the entire school. Oh, and all her remaining friends decided she wasn't worth being friends with anymore.

She found out relatively quickly that nobody really liked her, and if the comments on Gossip Girl were anything to go by, they were glad to see her fall. It was a big dose of reality for a girl who didn't even like small ones.

That set off a chain reaction: because Blair found herself in the middle of her junior year suddenly friendless, she did pathetic things like lurk in the library during lunch. And because she was lurking in the library during lunch, she met Dan Humphrey, who had spent every lunch period of the last few years lurking in the library because he hadn't had any friends to start with.

The most embarrassing part was that she had been…well, she had been sort of crying.

Penelope of all people had humiliated Blair in homeroom (it was just some stupid little comment, but everyone in class had laughed uproariously as though it was the height of wit) and she'd been bottling up her reaction all day because she didn't want anyone to see her upset. So as soon as the bell rang for lunch, she made a break for the dullest section of the library, sat right down on the floor, and cried.

It wasn't like she expected anyone to see her. Who goes to the Latin Grammar section to find themselves a book?

The boy that turned the corner froze like Bambi at the wrong end of a shotgun. "Uh," he said, very eloquently. "You okay?"

"Do I look okay?" Blair snapped. She rubbed impatiently at her tears with the heel of her hand, clambering to her feet. "You can't just go around walking in on people. That is highly impolite."

"We are literally in a public place," he said. "Seriously, though, are you –" He paused uncertainly, teeth worrying his lip for a brief moment. "You're Blair Waldorf, right?"

"Yes, that's me." She elbowed past him. "No comments please."

But he stopped her, touched her arm lightly, and said with sincerity, "Hey, I'm sorry. I think everyone's being pretty shitty to you."

Blair paused. It had been weeks since anyone had been even a little bit nice to her.

"Why would I care about some nobody's opinion?" Blair said, and left.

 

 

 

 

 

 

She ran into him in the library a few times after that. Not that she spoke to him – hardly. But she would see him, sitting alone a couple of tables away. Once their eyes met and he nodded, curt and perfunctory.

She had no idea who he was, that he was even in her grade, until she happened to catch him filing out of a classroom after Nate one day. Not that she was looking for Nate or anything. She couldn't control every single thing her gaze happened to fall on.

Their schools were not large schools, so it was strange for her to not recognize someone in her grade. The library guy could be a transfer, but then it would be even stranger for her to not have heard of him. It was all highly suspicious.

"You know," she said in the library one lunch period, "I wasn't crying. The other day."

He looked up from his book, startled. "Okay?"

"I had something in my eye. Just to clarify."

He nodded and they returned to their books. Then he said, "You know my sister, I think. Jenny?"

Blair blinked; Jenny had a brother? She looked over at him again, this time searching for similarities, and found very few. Maybe around the mouth. "Ah. Right. Jenny Humphrey."

Jenny, to her credit, had tried to stick around post-fallout but Blair wasn't interested in charity case friendships.

"She feels really – uh, well, she likes you a lot, and I don't think she necessarily agrees with, uh, everything," he said. "She doesn't think that –"

"That I'm a big slut who got what's coming to her?" Blair said bluntly. She liked to say things very bluntly occasionally, if only to get ahead of other people saying them instead. "Well, she's the only one."

"I'm sure that's not true," he said.

Blair raised an eyebrow. "Really? Then why am I sitting all alone in the library with –"

She had no idea what his name was. He supplied, "Dan."

"With Jenny Humphrey's brother," Blair continued. "Everyone thinks I'm awful. And maybe I am. I cheated on Nate. I did it specifically to make him feel bad, as _revenge_. And it isn't like I'm a stranger to things like that. There was this girl, Macy Lane Matthews, who scored higher than me on last year's history final, so I had the girls serve her a Nairtini at Isabel Coates' pool party. That's not a normal thing to do, right? I do things like that all the time. The girls were just putting up with me. And now they don't have to."

He was quiet like he didn't know what to say. "Have you ever tried being nicer?"

Blair rolled her eyes, now stupidly wet. "Gee, never would have thought of that."

With the kind of good humor often reserved for people about to cry, he said, "C'mon, give it a shot. Say something nice to me."

She had no idea what kind of nice thing one said to a stranger. She wrinkled her nose. "Your clothes are rumpled and your blazer is ill-fitting."

He stared at her. "That is actually the opposite of what you were supposed to do."

"Well I'm not very good at this!" she exclaimed.

"Obviously."

"I just don't know _how_." Blair slumped in her chair a little, arms crossing. "This is stupid."

"Hey, it's not so bad on this side of the fence," Dan tried. "Quiet. No one bothers you. It's like you're invisible. You just have to get used to birds flying into your head and automatic doors never opening."

Blair refused to crack a smile.

"Oh, what do you know," she huffed, and was luckily rescued by the ringing of the bell. For once she was eager to go back to class.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The idea came to her sometime between the end of that day and the beginning of the next one. It was a little crazy, but the best plans always were.

The next time she was in the library, she sat directly next to Dan.

"Nobody likes me," Blair said. She felt a sting at the words, but there was really no use dancing around it at this point. "Nobody knows you." She had researched him a little bit in the interim between idea-having and plan-executing. "I do, now," she continued, and off his look, "I like to keep an eye out for academic rivals. You're in the top five at St. Jude's."

He contemplated her with very faint suspicion. "Top three."

Something in the almost haughty way he said that only reassured her that she was taking the right course of action. "Look, I need an image overhaul. And you need relevancy. _Desperately_."

Amused, Dan asked, "Oh, do I?"

"Don't tell me you like hiding out here every day. You just do it because you don't have any other options."

"Please, stranger, tell me more about my life."

Blair ignored him. "You can help me and I can help you. A mutually beneficial arrangement. Symbiotic."

His brow furrowed. "What are you talking about?"

And Blair told him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

That was two weeks ago, which brings everything back to Monday morning at school and two people preparing to embark on a venture that (in Dan's opinion, anyway) will undoubtedly crash and burn.

"But you're still doing it, aren't you?" Blair asks triumphantly.

Dan mutters, "Yeah, and I should have my head examined."

It was simple, really: Blair would take Dan from pariah to belle of the ball (she'd done much more with much less in the past), and he would make her…socially pleasant to be around and more considerate of others.

"I'm only doing this because I feel bad for you," Dan says.

"Back at you," Blair tells him.

 

 

 

 

 

 

There is also the part about making Nate sick with jealousy.

It isn't the _main_ intention of The Plan but it is certainly a feature. A new boy on her arm will distract from Blair's disastrous love life and the mystery about who he is will be better gossip than her stealth pregnancy test. It's classic misdirection. They'll all be looking left at the shiny new faux-boyfriend and Blair will be running right past them into being a better, more evolved person.

"I feel like your logic is…questionable at best," Dan says. "Also I thought you said part of this was about helping me meet girls. How am I supposed to meet a girl when I'm fake-dating you?"

"Easy. Being seen with me will increase your value. It'll _give_ you value."

"I thought nobody liked you anymore."

Stung but refusing to show it, she says, "I'm still a Waldorf. And this is what I do best – who is the most eligible boy at St. Jude's, hm? And how do you think he got that way? Nate Archibald wasn't born with perfect hair and manners. I _made_ him. I am an expert at crafting the perfect boyfriend. Which you will be, for someone else, once I'm queen bee again and we have an amicable faux-breakup."

Dan spends a lot of time just looking at her like she has two heads. "Is this another of your revenge things or do you actually want to be better? Because if it's the former, I'm honestly not –"

"I do," she interrupts, but then repeats more firmly, "I do."

He doesn't respond immediately, trying to gauge her sincerity. Apparently deeming her sincere enough, he sighs and says, "I think we are definitely going to regret this."

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blair is up before dawn the morning following their debut, eagerly scrolling through Gossip Girl at her desk. There's only one post, sandwiched between Kati's new custom-made flats and Penelope's apparently trendsetting jewelry choices (which, _please_ ; Blair went through a heart-themed jewelry phase when she was _thirteen_ , it's over), but it has more comments than both so Blair is satisfied.

The first picture is of Blair sitting with Dan dead center in the courtyard, lifting her hand to fuss with his hair, which had a natural curl that was fighting her styling. They look far from blissfully happy but that only seems to sell it – Blair's little frown and Dan's half-rolled eyes conspiring to make them look comfortable, like a real couple. The second picture is even more promising. In it she looks away, attention caught by something, and Dan is giving her a curious look, almost smiling. The title of the post reads, in bold pink, _Has B moved on from her torrid past?_

Blair practically thrums with excitement. Her gaze is drawn to the second picture for another moment before she goes to read the comments, steeling herself for the expected rudeness. She isn't disappointed, exactly; there are a lot of remarks about how Blair is moving on too fast, how Blair is slumming it with a scholarship kid, how desperate she must be. But there is a small, strong groundswell of interest. They want to know who Dan is. They want to know what's going on. They want to know about Blair, even after everything.

Pleased, she shuts the laptop and starts to get ready.

Blair had considered a new look to go with her new image but at the end of the day she decided to change very little. She tweaks her outfit to look slightly more casual, throwing her hair up into an effortless ponytail that takes a full hour to achieve and trading in heels for flat boots. She doesn't button her shirt all the way up to the collar, letting it lay slightly open to reveal the BW necklace glimmering at her clavicle. She still wears a headband, but she has relegated her ruby heart ring to the back of the jewelry box, putting a statement cocktail ring on that finger instead so everyone will notice its absence.

She studies herself in the mirror and is reminded just slightly of Serena, a name she tries hard not to think of. Angry as she still is with her missing friend, the illusion makes her feel braver. Serena never cared what anyone thought of her. It's just too bad she doesn't care more about Blair.

"You look nice," Dan says, casual and friendly, when he sees her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

That day after school, Blair drags Dan shopping. His uniform is well and good during the week, but considering how smoothly things are going, soon enough Blair will be seen in non-school public with him. She suspects his personal style is tragic.

"Do you know what Isabel said to me during U.S. History?" Blair asks, thrusting another shirt through the dressing room curtain to him.

"I can't afford, like, _any_ of this," Dan says.

"Oh hush." Blair leans against the wall outside, giving a condescending look to the lurking salesgirl before remembering that she's supposed to be a better person and trying for a smile. She's not sure it's successful from the look on the girl's face. "Iz said you were cute. She offered me _congratulations_."

"Well, if Iz says it…" he mumbles. "This sweater is _seventy dollars_."

"I know, it's on sale," Blair says with a wrinkle of her nose. "But pay attention, Humphrey. Isabel may be notoriously kind-hearted but she's also too dopey to lie, so she's a fair enough example of public opinion."

Sarcastically: "Great."

Blair sighs loudly, rolling her eyes. "Open up and let me see."

There is a long, stagnant pause. "No?"

"Don't be a baby." Blair whips the curtain aside, startling Dan something fierce, and then steps into the little cubicle, appraising him. "Hm." She takes in the fit of the sweater, a thin dark green cashmere that clings to the shape of his shoulders, and the jeans, which fit closely but not tightly. "Not bad, Humphrey."

"I'm not sure I know you well enough for you to be in here with me," Dan says, frowning.

Blair smirks. "I'll keep my hands to myself. This is good – but not the green, I don't think. The red instead." She observes him shrewdly. "Maybe blue."

"I like red," he offers.

"I suppose I can learn to compromise." Blair smiles at him. "That's why you're here, isn't it?"

"Allegedly." He tugs at his shirt a little. "Alright, can I get out of this?"

"Don't let me stop you," Blair says playfully. She lets him wallow in discomfort for a moment before excusing herself, calling over her shoulder, "I'll pay. No complaining!"

Blair also has him treat her to dinner at Butter, and by "treat" one is meant to read "escort," because Blair is the one who actually pays. He's uncomfortable and fidgety all through the meal and by the time they're having dessert (a slice of rhubarb and lime tart, with candied pistachios, which Blair orders but only has one bite of) she's long over it.

"What's your problem?" she snaps. "We have to be seen out. We're building mystery."

"I'm just not comfortable in places like this," he says. "And it's not fair that you have to pay for everything."

"You're not my real boyfriend, and I have more money than you," she says flatly. "And this is a mid-priced restaurant. Calm down."

"I think to do this right, if you really want to get out of your comfort zone, then we can't just do things you would normally do. I think you should come to Brooklyn."

"Ew," she says automatically. "Why?"

Dan gives her an exasperated look. "It's where I live."

"Oh. Right." Blair sits back in her seat, considering this, and then she has another bite of dessert, considering it further. "Your sister will be present, presumably. Have you figured out what you're going to tell her about all this?"

He's confused. "I already told her the truth."

Blair's eyes widen. "Seriously, Humphrey?" Doesn't he know anything? Jenny Humphrey may seem like a nice girl but Blair can smell her own; she knows there's viciousness buried underneath those ruffles and polka dots.

Dan raises his eyebrows at her. "My sister is not going to believe that Blair Waldorf is suddenly dating me."

Blair has to concede that, but she does so with as obnoxious a sigh as she can muster. "Alright, fine. But don't tell anyone else. You'll ruin everything before it starts, Humphrey."

He gets a slightly strange, inscrutable look on his face but it's not until they're leaving that she understands it.

"That's another thing," Dan says, hand on her lower back as he steers her outside, leaning down to speak quietly in her ear, "I think you should call me Dan."

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blair arrives in Brooklyn on Saturday afternoon in one of her more downmarket ensembles: a pink sweater over a striped blue button down with a white collar and black shorts. She puts her hair up and takes it back down three times, redoes her makeup twice, and then gets very angry at herself for caring about how she'll look at some dumb gallery in _Brooklyn_.

"Every little bit counts," she reminds herself, and Dorota, who nods supportively.

Dan doesn't come down to meet her, which would be the gentlemanly thing to do, so Blair has to enter the gallery on her own. There are a few artsy types milling around and a man adjusting the position of several pieces on the wall nearest the door. He's the only one to give her a second glance, perhaps because she looks so out of place. The artsy girls might as well be wearing piles of blankets.

"Can I help you, sweetheart?"

Blair narrows her eyes at the man. "Is there a Dan Humphrey here?"

He laughs and introduces himself as Dan's father, revealing he knows her name without her having to say it. "You're the girl my kids won't stop talking about," he says, which makes Blair faintly uncomfortable and more than a little intrigued. "They're through those doors there, in the café."

Blair tries not to appear hesitant as she crosses the gallery floor. The art is really nothing special; it looks like the kind of ridiculous pseudo-avant-garde stuff Serena's mother was always buying. She finally steps into the café, which is relatively packed for such a small, unremarkable sort of place. Someone calls Blair's name and she looks up to see Jenny waving frantically at her, a big beaming smile on her face. Dan is nowhere in sight.

"You're here!" Jenny says as Blair approaches, clutching her purse closely.

"Yes, somehow I managed it," Blair replies dryly.

"Great, because we're swamped," says the girl standing next to Jenny. She's roughly Blair's height, which means a little shorter than Jenny, but there's something about her that seems commanding anyway. She's very pretty, even if it looks like she's dressed in head to toe polyester.

"I don't see how that has anything to do with me," Blair says sweetly. "And you are?"

Jenny and the girl trade glances. "Vanessa," the girl says. "Dan said you were helping us out today."

"Didn't you get a message?" Jenny asks.

Blair looks down at her phone and sure enough there's a text from Dan. Good luck! it reads, along with a highly obnoxious winky face. I will kill you in your sleep, Blair responds, before returning her attention to the girls. "And where is Dan?"

"He had to run some errands for Dad," Jenny says. "He'll be back soon."

Vanessa thrusts out an apron, some hideous dark green tarp-like thing. "What do you know about making cappuccinos?"

"I've summered in Italy since before I could talk," Blair says, which actually means nothing in terms of making cappuccino, but she grabs the apron anyway.

There are few things Blair hates like not knowing how to do something and that afternoon she becomes very familiar with the feeling. Jenny has to show her how to use coffee machines several times but it's not until Vanessa's brusque-if-smirky run-through mid-rush that it starts to sink in. Blair has always learned better by spite.

By the time Dan returns, Blair has spilled a latte all over herself, burned her hand on the panini press, and gotten a dressing-down from a white girl with dreads over a badly made macchiato. She's feeling murderous. Dan pulls her away from the counter so he can properly bandage her burn.

"You threw me to the wolves," she hisses at him.

"Honest day's work is good for you." Dan runs cold water over her hand and then rustles through the first aid kit for some ointment and a bandaid. "It couldn't have been that bad."

"I'm disfigured!" she exclaims, hitting him hard in the arm with her uninjured hand. "And your girlfriend kept making snotty faces at me."

"Vanessa isn't my girlfriend, she's my friend, and she's just…protective. And a little prickly." He glances up with a little smile. "You probably don't know anything about that."

Blair glares at him. "I will hit you again."

Things go smoother with four of them there, and the amount of people begins to decline post-lunch. Dan sends Blair off with a sandwich and coffee for her troubles and she's so tired and bored that she actually consents to looking through one of Jenny's sketchbooks while she eats. Jenny chatters in her ear the whole time but Blair's attention is drawn behind her, to Dan and Vanessa's low conversation as they work.

"Are you for real with this girl, Dan?"

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I've heard you complain about her and her friends for two years." Interesting. "Not to mention you never liked all that stuff with Jenny. And now you're, what, dating her?"

Even more interesting – he hadn't told her. "It's not that simple," Dan hedges, and then they're interrupted while he sees to a customer. "I've recently sort of…seen a different side to her. I mean, she's not _that_ bad."

"Somehow I find that hard to believe," Vanessa says, but Blair has already tuned them out.

Blair cuts off Jenny mid-ramble. "They're good, Little J," she says absently, tapping a finger on one sketch in particular. "This one, the silver, especially. You should consider submitting to my mother, she does internships over the summer."

Jenny's eyes are the size of plates. "Really? You think I'd have a shot?"

"Anything's possible." She gives Jenny a patronizing smile. "Would you mind taking care of this?" She gestures to the wrapper and paper cup left on the table before sweeping off to bother Dan some more.

He does walk her out at the end of the day. "You know you're welcome to stay for dinner," he says. "Free of charge."

"I've already spent more than enough time in this borough, thanks." Blair sticks her poor, burned hand up in the air to flag down a cab, already dreaming of putting on her Natori pajamas and soaking her sore feet. "I expect compensation for my honest day's work, you know."

"How about my presence at another one of your pretentious restaurants?"

Blair snorts. "You're one to talk about pretentious. But fine. Accepted. And don't expect me to play barista for you again anytime soon."

"We'll see," Dan says vaguely. A cab finally pulls up and he goes to get the door for her. "One more thing. A little bit of a project for you."

Blair sighs. "Oh, goody."

"I want you to make a friend," he says. Off her furrowed brow, he adds, "Not one of those girls who followed you around before. A real friend."

"You make one," Blair retorts petulantly, feeling perhaps slightly too persecuted by this request. "I don't see you surrounded by a crowd of friends at school."

"Fair," he says with a little nod of his head. "But that's what you're helping me with. Just like I'm helping you. And I do have Vanessa – who you're more than welcome to try and make friends with."

Blair balks at that; she'd rather deal with Jenny's fawning. "I'll think about it." Then she pokes him sharply in the chest. "You start thinking about the Ivy mixer. That's our next event. My turf. You better shine, Dan."

"Like a diamond, Waldorf."

He gives her a little nod before she gets in her cab and drives off, grateful for a return to her normal life – but a little proud, too, of her blisters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are benefits to having chosen Dan Humphrey for a partner-in-crime, chief among them shared academic zeal. He makes a better study buddy than Dorota and he marks Blair's essays with a vindictiveness that has already brought her up half a letter grade. They've begun to spend their lunch period taking SAT practice tests, competing to see who can finish before the bell.

Blair peppers these sessions with tips for his Ivy mixer usher interview.

"That's great, Blair, but we both know I'm never going to get it," he says, somehow earnest and sardonic all at once. "Everyone knows Nate Archibald's getting the Dartmouth spot. He's a legacy."

"Ugh, _Dartmouth_ ," Blair scoffs, waving a hand. "You ought to be setting your sights higher."

"Higher?"

"I'll have you know, scholarship boy, that Yale's tuition is somewhat less costly _and_ they provide better financial aid. Plus Yale basically poached Dartmouth's entire English department, so you'd be getting the same old thing in _much_ prettier packaging. Really, who wants to live in New Hampshire?"

He gives her an odd look, eyes narrowing and head tilting. "Have you been doing college research for me?"

"Remaking you into a less substandard human is the whole point of this exercise, is it not?" she huffs. "I'm simply trying to make you consider the superior school. And _I_ am Yale legacy so I can pull some strings for you."

His eyebrows shoot towards his hairline. "You'd do that?"

Blair pats his arm. "I'm a nice person, remember?"

Dan isn't wrong, exactly: there isn't a shot in hell he'd land the Dartmouth spot, not with the Captain fighting to keep Nate on course. But he needs to land something. What Dan does reflects back on Blair now; Blair Waldorf only associates with the best, so Dan has to be the best of the best.

That night Blair emails her father for the first time in who knows how long. The entire process fills her with dread even though she expects nothing from him other than his usual banal kindness. Together her parents balanced each other, offense and retreat, Eleanor's nitpicky intensity and Harold's genial poise, but apart they fall to extremes. Eleanor is worse than ever. Harold is so far gone as to be unreachable.

Blair hits send with her eyes closed, like a child pretending to be invisible. As though she can remove herself from the situation just by willing it.

He surprises her with a phone call the next day, his voice warm and far away. "I didn't realize you had a new beau, Blair Bear."

"He's just a friend," she says, ruffled, unsure as to why this merited a call over anything else that happened to her during the past year. "Do you think you can put in a good word for him? I know the representative is an old friend of yours."

"Of course, dear, of course," Harold says. "You know I'll do whatever I can."

It's such a brief, meaningless conversation that Blair wonders why they bothered having it at all.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Apparently Blair's father cannot be trusted to come through on even the simplest of tasks, because the Yale spot ends up going to Chuck Bass.

"The solution is simple," Blair proclaims. "You just have to steal it."

Dan gives her one of those looks like she has six heads and all of them are spouting gibberish. It's very annoying.

She begins patiently, because he is still new to this. "I'm still Chair of the Community Outreach Committee –" She'd been voted in before her fall from grace, small miracles. "So I have to give a speech. You will attend as my guest and you will snake that representative right out from under Chuck Bass, which won't be hard because he's barely literate."

Dan's brow furrows. "How can I steal something that's assigned?"

Blair looks at him with genuine pity. "Oh, Dan," she says. "Oh, Dan, you have so much to learn from me."

She spends the remaining days before the mixer drilling Dan on Carey McNally, the Yale rep and her dad's old crew buddy. "I only met him once and he was extremely dull, but he has some kind of bizarre passion for bridges that you could probably work to your advantage."

On the day of, Blair meets Dan outside school, not a single hair out of place; she even put on pearls. This will be her first public speaking engagement since The Fall and she refuses to be anything other than cool, composed, and elegant. Her choice of charity is sufficiently heart wrenching (something with small sad orphans) and she had practiced her regal-yet-concerned expression in the mirror until it was second nature.

Dan, of course, looks less than ideal. One good thing about Nate was that Anne bought all his clothes, so he always looked utterly appropriate.

"Why aren't you wearing the shirt I bought you?" Blair demands, frowning.

"Sometimes you make me feel like a kept man," Dan remarks dryly. He tugs at his collar. "I _am_ wearing it."

Blair grimaces. "I must have been too blinded by that vest to see it. You manage to make good clothes look cheap, Humphrey. That is some ass-backwards kind of talent."

"You're so kind, Blair."

"And, god, did you shave with a lawnmower?" She reaches up to tilt his face side to side, observing at least five nicks and flicking away a tiny forgotten patch of tissue. She sighs, looking up at him. "What am I going to do with you?"

Dan gives her a wry look, equal parts amused and unimpressed, but then he smiles. "I don't know, Waldorf. You tell me."

She realizes her hands are still on his face, jaw warm and already a little prickly. She wonders how often he has to shave. The tilt to his head becomes inquisitive and the grin softens until it is gone entirely, his lips just slightly parted.

Blair pulls her hands back to her sides sharply, clenching her fists until her nails bite into her palms. "Can we get going already?"

Once inside, Blair shoves him in the direction of Chuck and McNally, watching for a moment until she can be sure Dan is insinuating himself into the conversation. He gets McNally to laugh, no mean feat, and Blair smiles thinly, like a proud and slightly manipulative mother. He can be funny in the right way when he wants to be.

Blair networks after that, making small talk with adults who don't know about her scandal or otherwise find themselves above such idle teenage gossip. She checks in with Dan from time to time, just a quick glance through the crowd, and scolds him silently when she catches him making eyes at that author J.L. Hall one too many times. _Fuck Dartmouth_ , she thinks, perhaps too venomously.

As if on cue, Nate appears at her shoulder. "So that's the guy," he says.

The back of Blair's neck tingles like someone's touched her there, light and ghostly. "Dan," she supplies. "Cute, isn't he?"

"How would I know?" Nate asks. "Looks like he's doing pretty good with Chuck's rep."

"Mm." Blair refuses to so much as glance at Nate. "He's gifted academically. He's second in your class, you know – what are you, again? Tenth?"

"C'mon, Blair," Nate huffs.

She gives in and looks over at Nate, but it's only to shoot him the most beatific of smiles. "He got into St. Jude's on _merit_ instead of family." It's a facetious brag that she'd come up with in the shower recently but as soon as it leaves her lips, it feels as good as true. "Can you imagine such a thing?"

She doesn't wait for Nate's reply before stalking off. She has people to impress.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blair has not forgotten Dan's little friendship edict. The trouble is, as always, that she wants for suitable options; the girls were never really friends so much as underlings, a prep school army wielding yogurt bombs. Jenny Humphrey still _wants_ so much from Blair, the light of it so bright in her eyes that Blair can barely quash the instinct to stamp it out. Serena is, for all intents and purposes, long gone. Vanessa is –

Vanessa is admittedly stimulating for someone like Blair, who enjoys a fight, but she's not sure that could be called friendship.

The other stragglers of the year – girls not quite wealthy or stylish enough to reach the upper echelons, or the girls who honestly don't care to try – have always been so far below Blair's notice that she can't imagine turning her attention to them now.

Dan isn't a friend so much as a business associate.

It's really a very unfair assignment.

Blair is sitting on her own one morning – Dan had an early meeting with the guidance counselor over college-related something or other – going over her pro and con lists of potential girls to make into friends when she hears a muffled sob somewhere behind her. She automatically freezes. It happens again, the very distinct sound of someone crying right behind Blair in the almost-empty courtyard. Do-gooder Dan would tell her to inquire as to whether this person, whoever it is, is okay. Blair wants to slide to the ground and creep away as fast as she possibly can.

Instead, after another moment's deliberating, Blair takes a deep breath and turns around. "Are you –" She stops, surprised, because it's Iz sitting there practically hidden in a corner, face half-buried in a pile of Kleenex. "Iz?"

Iz appears comically caught, her eyes going so wide Blair can see all the way around the iris. "Blair. I didn't know that was you."

Blair suppresses a frown; she's practically a shadow these days. "Are you alright?"

At that, Iz bursts into a fresh round of tears. Blair genuinely has no idea what to do with that; if it were her crying, she certainly wouldn't want to be bothered by anyone. That's why she used to sit in the farthest corner of the library to do it. But someone had bothered her, even there.

So Blair gets up tentatively and moves over to sit beside Iz. After some coaxing, the entire story comes out: Iz's parents have been going through a rough divorce, her mother planning her remarriage before the ink is even dry on the papers, and they're in the middle of a vicious custody battle to determine the fate of Iz and her two little sisters. Blair listens and listens and has no idea what to say.

"At least no one moved to France with their gay lover?" she tries. Iz looks at her, startled, and then she laughs, which startles Blair in turn. She smiles. "You know, it's weird, but if you run cold water on your wrists after you've been crying, it helps? And sort of pat it under your eyes – no splashing. It takes the swelling down a bit and it doesn't disrupt your makeup as much. All you need to do is reapply concealer and no one would ever know." Blair pauses. "But don't powder. Because of the tissues, it'll cling to all the dry patches on your nose and look ridiculous."

Iz stares at her for a moment with a strangely soft, kind look that Blair is not certain she's ever seen from Iz directly before. "Thank you, Blair."

Blair bristles. "I didn't do anything."

"Venting helped," Iz admits. She doesn't look bad at all, really, for having just been crying. Iz was always stupid pretty and now she honestly just looks flushed and lovely, if a little red around the eyes. "Plus it's not like you owe it to me, after everything."

Uncomfortable, Blair shrugs. "You were crying."

Iz bites her lip. "Um. There's this – it's a party, called Kiss on the Lips? If you wanted, um…" Iz dives into her purse and emerges a moment later with a slightly crumpled invite that reads _Isabel Coates and Guest_. "I could put your name on the list. In case."

Blair blinks at her. "What about Penelope?"

Iz smiles. "What about her?"

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blair picks Dan up from his subway stop in a cab and ignores his glaring the entire way to the club, making idle chatter as she looks out the window. "Who throws a party in Queens, honestly," she says, smoothing her skirt for the hundredth time. "Penelope is so hopeless."

"Hmph," says Dan.

"Oh, come on," Blair says. "How much time do I spend in Brooklyn, hm? You can suck it up for one night. I even did what you wanted! I was nice to Iz and she extended an invitation as a show of _friendship_."

He sighs a little, looking at her with pathetic puppy dog eyes. "I know," he says. "You're right."

Blair smiles smugly. She does love to hear those words.

Dan tugs at his tie, loosening it enough to bare his throat. It doesn't look half bad. "I guess I'm just nervous."

"Don't worry." Blair reaches over to pat his knee. "I won't, say, leave you alone with two girls you barely know to work a panini press with a grudge."

Dan just grins at her.

The party is, annoyingly, beautiful. As soon as they step through the doors, Blair understands why Penelope would go with a venue in Long Island City; the space is large and industrial with big, gorgeous windows and a second level that looks down onto the packed dance floor. There are twinkling lights everywhere, intimate dark corners, tables heaped with booze and appetizers. It doesn't look unlike a party Blair would throw. She swallows hard, feeling unsettled and unseated.

Dan takes her hand and squeezes it. "Bourgeois as hell," he says in her ear, voice such a parody of pretentiousness that Blair genuinely can't help laughing.

Blair knows the appropriate thing to do is make the rounds, so she drags Dan over to the lush couch where Penelope is holding court with the rest of the girls. "Blair," Penelope says. "I'm touched you could make it."

"Gee, Pen, I'm touched you'd invite me," Blair says, and hears Dan snicker beside her.

Penelope's gaze shifts over to him briefly. "Is this your date?" She makes a show of looking past Blair and Dan, searching the crowd. "Where's the other one?"

"Other one?" Blair repeats, knowing she's setting herself up for a barb but unable, in the moment, to circumvent it.

"Don't you have a second one?" Penelope wonders innocently. "I know you really like to have two guys at once."

All of the girls titter except for Iz, who shoots Blair an apologetic look.

Dan leans forward a little with a quizzical look on his face. "What was your name again?" he asks, and it's such a first grade attempt at an insult that Blair could pat him on the head. Penelope looks annoyed, however, and it's worth it to see her have to introduce herself begrudgingly at her own party.

"Where are you from?" Hazel asks Dan. "Like, Staten Island?"

"Aren't you," Kati's voice lowers, " _on scholarship_?"

"I heard you like totally stole the Yale rep from Chuck Bass," Iz says, with a smile. Blair isn't sure she ever noticed that Iz was nice; she always thought Iz was a little dim, honestly.

"Not the only thing he stole from Chuck Bass," Penelope adds in a stage whisper.

"I'm from Brooklyn," Dan says evenly, "And I'm pretty sure you can't steal a person."

Penelope arches an eyebrow slightly. "You should probably ask the other guy."

"Penelope, you seem _very_ concerned with my love life." Blair slips her arm through Dan's, because he's starting to get that challenging look on his face, like he might start something. "Although I suppose it's easy to be jealous when you're in the middle of a drought yourself."

She expects Penelope to look irritated, but instead she smiles. "Enjoy the party, Blair," she says, then turns away to whisper to Hazel.

Both disconcerted and momentarily bested, Blair tugs Dan away towards the bar. She needs a major drink. Scratch that – she needs at least three.

She shoos Dan away at a certain point (they can't spend the entire evening clinging to each other like limpets, how tragic) and she finds a perch on the second tier, observing everyone below. She sees Chuck in the far corner with some poor freshman and sends in a quick tip to Gossip Girl that Chuck has gonorrhea, because it might as well be true. As far as Blair's concerned, it counts as public service. She waits until the girl checks her beeping phone, makes a face, and pulls away before turning her own attention elsewhere.

She finds Dan in the middle of a crowd of lacrosse boys. With a quick intake of breath she realizes Nate is standing beside him. Dan looks at ease, hands in his pockets, posture relaxed, and whatever he says makes the whole group of cretins laugh. Nate slaps Dan on the back companionably, though as far as Blair knows this is the first time they've spoken.

_Loner, my ass_ , Blair thinks. He persecutes himself on purpose.

"I assume this is your work." A hand thrusts a phone in front of Blair – a hand with several rings on it and emerging from a purple shirt-cuff. Chuck.

"It's probably the work of one of your call girls," Blair says airily, sipping her fourth champagne. "You should do better STD screening. Or any at all, really."

"I don't have gonorrhea," Chuck drawls.

Brightly, Blair says, "Syphilis, then?" She pushes away from the railing, starting to thread through the crowd away from him, but Chuck follows.

"Saw your new boy," he says. "I knew you liked slumming it, but this is a new low."

"Yes – funny, handsome, smart, what _am_ I thinking?" Every time Blair ticks off Dan's better qualities they start to sound less and less facetious. Why does everyone think he's such a disaster? Blair included, really; there was the bad clothes, the bad hair, the unapproachable manner, but all of that was easily fixed. Now he's entertaining the golden boys of St. Jude's with barely a hitch. "Everyone's very interested in Dan all of a sudden. I suppose it's because he's very interesting."

"Or because you're very transparent," Chuck counters, amused. "He's a last resort and everyone knows it. You'll do anything to salvage your reputation. It's pathetic."

"No, I think that's you, actually." Blair thrusts her empty flute at him and stalks off, her skin crawling and spirit sinking for no logical reason – it's just what Chuck does to her. He makes her feel like crap.

And of course, because she's feeling pathetic, Blair runs smack into Penelope again.

"Enjoying yourself?" Penelope looks like the cat that ate the canary, but even despite the smugness Blair can't deny she looks good. She's in a tight-fitting black dress with rhinestones dotting the neckline, delicate diamond bracelets glittering on each wrist, and a sparkling headband nestled in her dark hair. Blair had recently renounced headbands; it was time.

"What a lovely hostess," Blair says sarcastically. "Are you this concerned about every guest or am I special?"

Penelope smiles with all her teeth like the Cheshire cat and doesn't look away from Blair as she calls, "Sweetie, did you get my drink?"

"Yeah, I –" Nate falters as he steps up next to Penelope, holding a beer in one hand and a bright pink cocktail in the other. "Oh, hey, Blair."

Blair feels very certain that she is experiencing hysterical blindness. There is no way – _no way_ – that after everything, after the cavalcade of humiliation that has been Blair's life for the past year, Penelope Shafai has snagged _Nate_. But there Penelope is, taking the drink and leaning up to kiss Nate's cheek. At least he has the courtesy to look uncomfortable.

Nate didn't want Blair. He made that abundantly clear. Yet he'd replaced her with essentially her own evil twin; Penelope has so clearly been remade in Blair's image that she could probably sue for use of likeness.

Blair is still frozen to the spot when she feels a hand on her waist and hears Dan's voice say, "Hey, Waldorf, I was looking all over for you." She doesn't even think to fake a smile as she turns because she's still so appalled, and then she doesn't get a chance to because Dan kisses her.

Dan's mouth. On her mouth. It isn't a peck, either. His body is very close, that hand on her waist tucking her against him as he leans into her, Blair tilting back. It's a good kiss. It's a kiss like a movie, a kiss with a soundtrack; Blair doesn't believe for one second Dan's as inexperienced as he implies if he can kiss like _this_.

His smile when they pull apart is equal amounts smug and genuine. He pretends to notice Nate and Penelope a half-second later, doing an admirable act of boyish embarrassment. "Oh, sorry," he says. "I didn't realize you were there." He peers at Penelope. "What was your name again?"

Blair is still laughing when they leave not long after, Dan suppressing a smile as he darts ahead to hail a cab. She jabs him sharply in the chest. "You could be _good_ at this if you wanted to be," she says, thinking of Penelope, the kiss, the way he was with the other boys.

"Yeah, well," Dan says. "Same to you." He gives her a sidelong glance. "Sorry if the kiss was a boundary-crossing thing. I just saw you there and acted on instinct."

"Some instinct," Blair muses.

"So." He bites his lip, all amused. "How was it?"

"Oh, shut up," she huffs. "Don't look so pleased with yourself."

"I think I felt you swoon in my arms a little."

"You're going to feel me puke on your shoes in a minute."

Dan's grin only widens as he hands her into the cab and for the briefest flicker of a moment, Blair remembers what that mouth felt like pressed against her own.


	2. tell me something true

"What I don't understand," Dan says, as he lets Blair direct him around her living room, all the furniture pushed close to the walls, "is how many excuses you people find for a party."

"Cotillion isn't merely a _party_ ," Blair says, something of a reprimand in it. They pass each other, clasp hands, move on to other, invisible partners. Dan is hopeless at choreography.

"That's right. It's an antiquated –"

"– charming –"

"– sexist –"

"You're a boy, what do you know –"

"Where you spend all this money to parade girls around for attention –"

"Cotillion teaches grace and poise, which every girl should –"

"Oh, you just want to wear a big dress and tiara."

Blair makes sure to step on his feet a few times. "You know, you could use some grace and poise yourself."

Dan raises his eyebrows. "I am not the one stepping on their dance partner."

"I'm making a point," Blair says. "Cotillion will be the ultimate test for us and cotillion will be the ultimate triumph if we play our cards right." She starts to get swept up in the idea. "For me, it's a chance to rise above my detractors – a phoenix from the ashes, better than before. And for you it'll be a transformation. Ultimate outsider to ultimate insider. It all hinges on cotillion."

Dan always looks at her like she's crazy, but there's increasing affection in it lately. "Say cotillion one more time."

Blair makes a face at him. "Cotillion."

Catching Dan up on the choreography has made Blair unexpectedly sad, albeit in an abstract and untouchable way. He's terrible, there's no denying it – his timing is way off and he has no interest in applying himself – and that just makes her think of how not-terrible Nate had been. She and Nate had practiced together since they were children, enrolled in baby ballroom by their mothers. He was a natural, and Blair always felt terribly romantic in his arms, allowing him to dutifully spin her.

Since her trouble started, she's only been going to the bare minimum of practices. Just enough to keep her spot, which she wouldn't dream of giving up, and even that had been awful, an instructor standing in for the partner she didn't have. "You'll need someone soon," they'd told her, as if Blair hadn't known.

Her thoughts must show on her face, because Dan gives her shoulder a shake, completely breaking form. "C'mon. Remind me why this is good for me, again."

She's been working in little boyfriend tips here and there, fulfilling her end of the bargain to turn him into the perfect partner. "Do you know how much girls love a good dancer?"

"Shockingly, this is something I have learned from the television." Dan forgets which direction he's supposed to go in and does a funny little turn as he tries to get back on path. The music tinkles along merrily in the background. "Anyway, I'm not so hopeless – I did pretty well the other night, didn't I?"

Blair can feel herself go scarlet, which is _absurd_ , and she hopes her Chanel Vitalumière is doing a good job of hiding it. "I mean, if you want to call that a kiss –"

"Oh, no, not that." His hand lands on her waist in the exact same spot, and they're very close for a moment before the dance has them parting. "Didn't I tell you? I sort of met a girl."

She blinks and misses a step. "You _were_ busy that night, weren't you?"

Dan ducks his head. Blair is starting to wonder at his shyness. "It looks like your good work is starting to pay off after all."

"Hm." Blair turns away from him and crosses to shut off the music. That's more than enough practice for today. "What's her name?"

Dan tells her (it's no one Blair knows, a girl who transferred to Constance from Spence last year) as he shifts the furniture back into place. "I mean, we just talked school stuff." He gives Blair a half-smile. "I have a girlfriend, remember?"

Having a real girlfriend doesn't mean much to most boys, so Blair can't imagine a fake one means much more. "I'm your first, aren't I? Real or fake?"

For some reason he goes a little pink, adjusting the position of an end table, and gives a quick nod.

"You'll have to bide your time, of course – keep her interested without seeming like a creep who's stepping out, and then like you aren't moving on _too_ fast after our breakup."

He rubs the back of his neck. "Jeez, Blair."

"Come here." He looks wary, which makes her smile. "I'm not going to eat you. I'm your friend. I'm helping." Dan makes his way over to where she's leaning against the sideboard, waiting for him. "You should touch her. Nothing over the top. Nothing obscene. Just –" Blair trails her fingertips down his arm to his wrist. "Girls like to be touched."

"I touch you all the time," Dan says, and his arm snakes around her waist, tugging her close.

"I noticed." Blair bites her lip, looking up at him, and then evades his grasp, slipping away. "Fast learner."

"Blair."

She turns to face him, eyebrow arching.

"I'm proud of you," he says, which is not what she expected. "Talking to Isabel again, putting in time at the gallery. I even heard, uh, some nice things you said about me to, um, Nate. Which was probably bullshit, but…" He shakes his head a little and shrugs. "I maybe don't regret this deal we made."

Blair smiles genuinely, and her little bit of cat and mouse play begins to feel silly, miscalculated.

"Even school," Dan continues. "I applied for this summer thing, and I think I might get it. I never would've even tried for it without you hassling me about Yale, so – you know, thank you. You've helped me. And I want you to know that."

A strange sensation is rising in Blair's chest, that feeling you get between tripping and hitting the ground. It would be a staggering coincidence for Dan to be talking about this – the program she had spent years thinking about, months working on an application for, carefully crafting essays and curating letters of recommendation. The program that got so many applicants from Upper East Side prep schools that they only ever took one person from the combined student body of Constance and St. Jude's.

It would just be too much of a coincidence.

But Dan had helped her with those essays.

"That summer thing," she says, smile suddenly feeling fixed. "What's it called?"

"You know it," he says, then tells her, and Blair's stomach drops like hitting the ground.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The girl who transferred from Spence to Constance is named Nelly Yuki and the only reason Blair hasn't gotten the lowdown on her before now is because one look told her Nelly Yuki was too tragic to ever really be competition. If Nelly is the kind of girl Dan likes, then it's no wonder both of them are alone, too busy slinking around corners with their noses in books to notice any other human life forms.

Nelly hasn't changed since that first time Blair and the girls went around to scope out the newbie: big unfashionable glasses, dull skin, flat hair, and a clothing color palette straight out of some fictional dystopian future world. Like Blair said: tragic. She's not even sure how Nelly ended up at Kiss on the Lips.

Blair drops all of her books onto the table next to Nelly with a huffy put-upon sigh, receiving a pointed look from the librarian for being too noisy. It's Blair's free period, the one she usually spends in the coffee shop around the corner, by herself. But today she's spending it in the library.

Nelly looks up, not expecting the interruption.

"SATs," Blair says with that over-the-top put-upon-ness anyone in their class would sympathize with. "Getting in as much prep as I can."

"Uh-huh." Nelly's gaze travels from Blair to the pile and back. "Look, I don't know what you heard but I was only tutoring the other girls because that ringleader Penelope basically _blackmailed_ me into it, I have no interest in –"

"Whoa, whoa, Nelly Yuki, calm down." Blair blinks at her in feigned innocence, lashes fluttering. "I don't need tutoring. I just sat down here because, well, you seemed nice." Nelly doesn't seem to be buying that, so Blair adds, "I heard you met my boyfriend. I mean, he said you were nice. He liked you."

_Great job, Blair_ , she thinks with an internal eye roll. It was the word _boyfriend_ that had her flustered, sounding weird in her voice, out of her mouth. For all she's heard it from others, she never thinks of Dan as her boyfriend, or even calls him that herself. Because he isn't her boyfriend, not really.

Nelly gives Blair a curious, assessing look. "Oh. Okay."

"No one wants to sit alone, even to study," Blair goes on to say, voice still odd and too chipper. She concentrates on opening one of her prep books and then just stares at the text, her hands laying on the page, unblemished skin and ice-pink nails. She used to be good at this sort of thing. She could psychologically crush a girl while prying out the information she wanted all without leaving a mark. Now that she's _nice_ she can't even manage to be normal for thirty seconds.

Nelly Yuki puts a hand on Blair's arm. Last year, a girl like Nelly Yuki wouldn't even dare to brush Blair's _sleeve_. "I don't know what you think happened, exactly," Nelly says cautiously. "But we just talked a little."

"I don't know what you're implying." Blair's voice is too cold where it was too pleasant before.

"Nothing," Nelly says, jerking her hand back to her side. "I'm not implying anything."

After that Blair is too embarrassed to stay or go, so she and Nelly focus on their respective tasks until the bell rings and Blair runs off like she's on fire.

"I'm such an _idiot_ ," she complains to Iz after school, face buried in one of the overly frilly pillows that decorate Iz's bed. They never used to go to anyone's house except Blair's, but times have changed.

When Blair emerges from the pile of pillows, Iz looks sympathetic. "That is…pretty bad," she says, but she's only able to keep a straight face for a second before dissolving into giggles. "In front of _Nelly Yuki_. God, Blair, that's like…a new level of embarrassing yourself."

Blair thwacks her with a pillow, frowning. "Yes, thank you, Isabel, _I was not aware_."

"It's just super absurd. Like, Dan is so into you, I don't know why you'd even worry."

Blair harrumphs at that. She can't very well tell Iz the truth, but reminding herself of it highlights how ridiculous it is that she'd overreact about Dan and Nelly Yuki. What does she care if he makes eyes at some loser in last year's specs?

Finally, when the silence has stretched a beat too long, Blair says, "You're right. Plus it's not like I even care." She frowns, slumping into the bed. "He's just some nobody from Brooklyn. Of course his first real party would go to his head."

Iz arches an eyebrow and makes her hands into little claws. " _Raaawr_ ," she says. "Harsh."

Blair rolls her eyes, but it's become increasingly impossible to ignore the way insecurity has buried its way under her skin. She tries to remain rational. She doesn't care if Dan likes someone. It doesn't mean anything. He won't get into Ivy Scholars this summer. He won't because he can't, because Blair needs that spot. She's worked too hard for that spot. Dan will not steal it from her. "What? It's true."

"Nothing, I just, you know…" Iz shrugs. "I thought you guys seemed pretty happy."

"Happy?" Blair repeats.

"Yeah, like –" Iz flips her laptop so it's facing Blair and scrolls through Blair's Gossip Girl tag. Practically everything on it features Dan – their heads bent together over a textbook, Dan standing impatiently next to Blair's locker as she digs for something, Blair fussing with the knot of his tie. "You're always together at school and – okay, don't get mad or anything, but you're a lot less uptight lately. Like, you're way more relaxed."

Blair's frown only deepens. She doesn't need someone like Dan Humphrey to make her less uptight. "I'm just using him." It's true in a way Iz doesn't realize. "He's not terrible looking and he's a passable kisser." She shuts the laptop with a snap. "High school boyfriends are pointless. If the last year taught me anything, it's that."

Iz snorts. "Yeah, that was some kiss alright," she teases. "He's hot, even if he is on scholarship."

Saying those words, hearing them echoed back to her, makes the tension seep out of Blair's back. He's nothing to her, ultimately. He isn't going to steal anything from her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Saturday afternoon once again finds Blair behind the counter at the Bedford Avenue Gallery. She's been coming by every other weekend to dole out drinks and sandwiches. By now she's tamed the finicky panini press, can make a macchiato in her sleep. She's even gotten over her qualms about touching the grimy handle of the dustpan, or wiping down the counters with a previously used sponge. She is truly – on the surface, at least – One Of Them. She had even shocked Eleanor once at breakfast with two perfect lattes.

Today involves none of her blue collar skills, however. Rain is coming down in sheets outside so the gallery isn't getting much traffic. Nevertheless the entire team is on hand: Vanessa fiddling obsessively with the music selection, Jenny sketching at an empty table, Blair deploring the state of her manicure, and Dan out in the other room helping his father dismantle the latest exhibit.

"Oh, leave this one," Blair says to Vanessa. "I love this song."

Vanessa looks up from the iPod and raises an eyebrow. "You love _this_ song?"

"Hidden depths," Blair remarks dryly. One of her nails is snagged. "I can't imagine you'd have a nail file?"

She doesn't, but Jenny does, so Blair hops off her stool and trots over. As she works her nail over, she can't help looking down at Jenny's drawing. "Have I seen this before?"

Jenny starts, eyes going wide, and says, "Yeah, I'm surprised you remember. You saw the rough draft, this is sort of updated." She tilts it up for Blair to see better.

Blair has always loved fashion drawings: the sweeping, slim figures in amorphous gowns, the splashes of color. Jenny's are annoyingly adorable, much like the girl herself; this one features a woman with a big blonde bouffant and comically overdrawn eyelashes in a silver gown with a gigantic bow at one shoulder. Jenny has painted in the slightest floral motif over the fabric. Blair looks at the whole thing put together and has the immediate pulse of _want_ she's gotten with a million dresses over the years, desirous of voluminous skirts and luxurious textures, beautiful things that feel as though they should rightfully belong to her.

"How much would it cost to make?" she wonders, fingertips tracing over the train.

"Make?" Jenny repeats. "Um. I haven't worked it out exactly. Why?"

Blair's cotillion dress is a Waldorf Designs original, a slate blue number with gold detailing that Blair had loved, once. Instead of answering Jenny, she asks, "How long would it take to put together?"

The rest of the rainy day is taken up with measurements and planning, Jenny's excitement so catching that Blair and even Vanessa get swept up in it. Jenny mumbles about brocade while she wraps Blair's various parts in a measuring tape, and Blair takes over the music much to Vanessa's protest, putting on the girliest pop she can find. Vanessa lectures them all on the evils of cotillion but it's with a smile on her face that Blair has never actually seen.

That's how Dan finds them hours later, his skin dusty and hands scraped up, looking every bit the worker, utterly exhausted. But when he sees the three of them he smiles, tentative and curious. "Okay," he says, "What did you do to Vanessa? Because the real Vanessa would never stand for –" He pauses, listening. "Is this Taylor Swift?"

"It's called having fun, Dan," Jenny says. "Maybe you've heard of it? Oh, wait –" She makes a face at him, which Dan mirrors right back at her.

"I have fun," he says.

"Sort of," Blair remarks. "If one's idea of fun is doing speed rounds on practice tests."

"That was _your_ idea, nerd," he reminds her, tugging on her ponytail as he passes by, and Blair smiles at him, because sometimes she can't quite help it.

Something like guilt prickles deep in her chest, but Blair ignores it. She's good at that.

 

 

 

 

 

 

By the time cotillion rolls around a month later, Blair thinks she might have permanent scarring from all the times Jenny stabbed her with a needle by accident ("By _accident_ ," Vanessa said once, sardonic, her eyebrow arching). But it's worth it when she puts the dress on for the final time in Jenny's room and looks in the mirror: the fabric is heavy, stiff and formal, but the dress is fitted to her exactly and the silver brings a shine to her skin, sets off the dark brown of her hair. It's perfect, and Blair thinks even her mother would be shocked to agree. It looks like the old her, the girl she thought was gone.

"Wow," Dan says.

Both Blair and Jenny swivel towards the door, startled, and Dan must read something on their faces because he puts his hand up in front of his, averting his eyes.

"Is this like a wedding thing?" he says. "Am I not supposed to see?"

Blair rolls her eyes, snorting a laugh. "You can look, Dan."

He gives her a wry smile as he drops his hand. "Ready to go?"

Dan doesn't look half bad himself – or he wouldn't if he didn't look like he wanted to crawl out of his skin. The tux is a little flashy for Dan, who usually considers a vest over a flannel shirt to be the height of formal dress, a charcoal suit with silver tie that complements her. He looks good. Not that Blair would ever dream of telling him that.

They're at the door to the hall when Dan stops her, hand on her wrist just above the silver glove. Blair is itchy with enthusiasm, can't wait to get in there and show off, so it's with impatience that she turns to him. " _What_?"

"Just – it's dumb, but –" He delves into his pocket and then holds his hand up to her, a slightly tangled necklace dropping from his fingers to dangle in front of her eyes. It's nothing special. From a somewhat tarnished silver chain hangs a geometric, vaguely art deco snowflake, studded with dark stones.

"Is this for me?" Blair asks, a sneer already in her voice. "Where'd you get it, the sale pile at a thrift store?"

Abashed, Dan says, "It's my mom's."

Blair's stomach does a funny little flip-flop. "Well, then." She turns, her back to him, and waits. "Go ahead."

The little snowflake falls against her chest and when Blair looks down at it, she doesn't mind how it looks there.

They find their place in line, a few behind Iz and her date, one of those indistinguishable North twins; Blair sees Kati has the other one. The line runs alphabetical all the way down to Waldorf, which Blair always liked, because it meant she had the last word. But right now she feels a slight twinge that there's no van der Woodsen right there with her, like they'd always planned.

Then she notices Dan sort of watching her out of the corner of his eye, like he's trying to hide it, and Blair laughs, sadness cracking. "Just admit it," she teases him. "You worship me. It's okay."

Dan laughs soundlessly, cheeks pinking as he looks away. "Nope, no way," he says. "I have…grown accustomed to your face."

"I don't think you were looking at my face," Blair says pleasantly. She leans into his shoulder a little and Dan responds with an arm around her waist, a loose hold. He's been touching her a lot more since they had that talk. She thinks Dan is fantastic at faking it but almost at the same time thinks he might kiss her; she doesn't know which is true. Dan is either really good at acting, or he's awful at it.

Blair is slightly nervous that something might happen when she steps up to be announced – some Carrie at the prom kind of thing, orchestrated by Penelope, that will leave Blair humiliated and murderous. But nothing happens except polite applause, Dan taking her hand, Blair dipping into an accidental happy curtsy.

That seems like the most dangerous part of the evening finished; all there is afterwards is picking at a fixed menu meal and taking a few turns around the dance floor. Dan doesn't embarrass her there. At least when he messes up, he's capable of covering it, and Blair's too flush on victory to mind a few slips. Iz gives her encouraging smiles whenever their eyes meet, and even the rest of the girls seem less cold-shouldered. Kati is primed to break now that Iz has been won over, and Hazel never had much of a mind of her own to start with. Plus there's Jenny Humphrey milling through the crowd in Blair's cast off cotillion gown, the blue and gold very pretty against her blonde hair. It doesn't feel entirely hopeless.

"You look nice."

Blair is sitting at her table chatting to Iz, Dan on her other side distracted by some argument with Kati's date about some movie Blair's never heard of. Blair looks up to see who had addressed her, and she's shocked to see that it's Nate.

Iz gives a curious lift of the eyebrows and dutifully busies herself with her water glass.

"Thank you," Blair says. "You too." Her eyes sweep over him, all cream and pale silver. "I'd almost forgotten how handsome you are, Archibald."

He tips his head towards the dance floor. "Old times' sake?"

Blair forgets to say anything to Dan. She just goes.

She and Nate fall into old steps with the casual precision of habit but it feels like just that – a habit, brushing her hair or picking out shoes for the day. Her stomach doesn't flutter, her hands don't shake. Nate doesn't make any mistakes, so she has no reason to poke fun or laugh at him. It all feels very…obligatory.

"I'm glad you're doing okay," Nate says. Blair hates when people say things like that, as though she was dying or something, and Nate hastily continues, "I just mean…even though things ended really messed up between us, I'm happy you're…you know, happy. You should be."

Blair is surprised, not least because such maturity is generally beyond her own grasp or understanding, so it certainly seems beyond Nate's. But he always had a good heart, so maybe she shouldn't be too taken aback. She kisses him on the cheek. "Thanks, Nate."

By the time they return to the table, Penelope is hovering, looking none too pleased. She's in a lacy, gilded lilac dress that even Blair has to admit looks incredible on her. Penelope learned from the best, finally combining sartorial expertise and meanness into one unified whole. "Hey, B," Penelope says. "I was just catching up with your date."

"It was scintillating," Dan says dryly.

Blair smirks. "I'm glad. I hope you didn't mind me absconding with yours."

Nate, ever the well-trained boyfriend, has sidled around so he's standing just behind Penelope instead of Blair.

"Of course not," Penelope says. "I really came over to congratulate you."

This raises Blair's suspicions. Even though she's already decided to count the night as a success, she can't imagine Penelope giving in so quickly. "Oh?"

"On the Ivy Scholars spot," Penelope says, as though it's obvious. Blair's spine goes straight as a steel pole.

Dan's brow furrows. "I didn't know they'd already chosen someone."

"Oh, well, I shouldn't _really_ say –" Penelope leans in conspiratorially. "I sort of have the inside scoop. My mother's on the board."

Blair internally runs through every name on the list. "There's no Shafai on the board."

"After the divorce, she went back to her maiden name." Penelope watches Blair closely. "Benedetti." When Blair doesn't say anything, she goes on, "It's funny, you know, because she mentioned the spot from our school was down to a few kids but they'd just had to discount someone because they got this reference call saying all sorts of things about the guy, like he had some cheating scandal and he even might be planning to _pay_ someone to take his SATs –"

"Shut up, Penelope," Blair says tightly. Dan gives her a confused look.

"So of course I had to ask who it was," Penelope continues, undeterred, "And I was _shocked_ –" Her eyes are very wide, to convey said shock. "– to hear it was your Dave. Sorry – Dan. Mom was really appalled, you know how she feels about cheating – just as Dad. Now. Who do you think could have _possibly_ spread all those _lies_ about Dan just to take him out of the running?"

"Pen," Nate sighs tiredly, but the intervention is much too late, damage already done.

Dan, however, is still looking at Blair, with a suspicious tinge encroaching on the doubt in his expression.

Blair tries to cut it off before it spreads any further. "Penelope's always been very jealous." She ignores Penelope's scoff. "She's just trying to ruin –"

"Why do you care, anyway?" Penelope interrupts. "You're just using him, aren't you? That's what you said to Iz, anyway. How did she phrase it – you said, 'he's just some nobody from Brooklyn.' Right?"

But Dan is _still_ looking at Blair, has not wavered in waiting for her to denounce this or confirm it. "Blair?"

Blair presses her lips together, stalling. "You don't understand," she starts, but that is apparently enough, because Dan gets to his feet.

"I should've known better," he says. It makes anger rise hot in Blair's chest, her cheeks going red with it.

"You're so judgmental," she snaps. "If you would just take a minute to _understand_ –"

"All I've done is try to understand you. Help you. But I guess it was all for nothing, because you're still pulling the same old stunts."

Everyone in the vicinity is watching them with a mixture of rapt enjoyment and discomfort. There's a word for that, enjoying someone else's pain. Eyes zip back and forth between Dan and Blair like following the ball at a tennis match.

"Just because you spent your entire life being too anti-social to understand how the real world works –"

"I should've known there was a reason everyone hated you, joke's on me for thinking you were different –"

"It's not like you could afford the program anyway," Blair snits. "You just went after it because it was mine."

Dan stares at her, frowning. "You're a real bitch," he says. It's something Blair's been called a lot in her life but somehow, coming out of his mouth at this moment, it's the worst thing anyone's ever said to her. "Like I said – I should've known better."

She feels herself go hard and protective and cruel. "You think you're so much better than me just because you serve four dollar lattes to out of town transplants. You think you're so superior."

"I don't, actually," Dan says, shaking his head. "I just stupidly thought this fake friendship was real."

Then he's gone, stalking off across the polished floor, leaving Blair standing there in her stupid custom-made gown feeling like a fool. "I hope you're happy," she says to Penelope, but the worst part is that she probably is.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After that Blair decides she doesn't care about Dan, not even a little bit. She's actually better off without him around.

There are downsides, of course. She can't sit in the library during lunch anymore, and she can't sit in the courtyard either because she has no interest in being subjected to Penelope's smug face or Iz's cringing apologies. They'd had a fight too, after cotillion.

"I can't believe you _told_ her what I said about Dan," Blair hissed. "I can never trust anyone. All of you, running behind everyone's backs to gossip, to reveal every single little tidbit you hear."

"It's not like that," Iz protested. "I didn't know it was a secret! You said it like – like it was no big deal, I just mentioned it to her, I wasn't trying to _tattle_."

So she hasn't been speaking to Iz either. Which doesn't matter because Blair doesn't care. She can be strong and solitary until she goes away to college and makes all new friends. But sometimes she wonders what exactly she did to Penelope to deserve such treatment – and then a guilty little voice pipes up in the back of her head: what _didn't_ she do?

Lunch finds Blair instead in the disused art rooms, where she begged a key off a teacher who felt sorry for her. She sits on the dusty desk (towel laid down between her and its surface, of course) and picks irritably at her yogurt-with-granola, heels knocking against wooden desk legs. That's where Jenny finds her, slipping silently onto the desk beside her.

"I come here sometimes too," Jenny says. "It's nice to have a quiet place to draw."

"I don't draw," Blair says, and her voice comes out rough, choked, where she had meant to sound cold.

"I figured." Jenny glances at Blair, then fishes a tinfoil-wrapped sandwich out of her lunch bag and offers Blair half. It's whole wheat, chicken cutlet, mustard. Nothing Blair would ever eat. She accepts half and takes a bite. "For the record, I keep telling him he's being stupid."

Blair takes a minute to chew and swallow, then sighs. "No," she says, because it's the worst part. "He's not."

"Alright, well…it was pretty messed up," Jenny says. "He shouldn't have called you that. Or gone after your spot."

Blair takes another bite of that sad little sandwich.

"But you didn't really…say those things about him, did you?"

Blair looks down at the sandwich in her hands with its two half-moon bite marks, her legs in their white stockings, her pale blue shoes against the dark floor speckled with paint. "Jenny, why are you here?"

Jenny seems surprised. "I felt bad."

"For me? Even after –" Blair clears her throat. "What I did?"

Jenny nods. "I know you don't…Like, I know I'm not your first choice of friend or anything. But I always wanted to be your friend, and after everything that happened last year, it seems like you could use one."

"I'm not a good friend." She never even tried to contact Serena after she went away. Serena was probably just as happy to be rid of her as everyone else.

"Maybe you just have to try harder," Jenny suggests, and there's something a little challenging in it.

Blair looks at her, that small, determined face. "You Humphreys don't give up, do you," she says.

Jenny grins at her. "It's kind of our thing."

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blair does three things after that. First she comes clean to Mrs. Benedetti, which, of course, disqualifies her from the program. Second, she starts having lunch in the courtyard with Jenny. Third, she decides to make amends with Dan. She goes to the gallery early on Sunday, before it opens, but the stone-faced person who opens the door for her is Vanessa.

"I should let you go all the way back to the city," Vanessa says over her shoulder on her way up into the gallery proper. "I shouldn't even bother _talking_ to you."

"And yet you are anyway," Blair says wryly. "Fancy that."

Vanessa turns on her heel, facing Blair with both eyebrows arching up incredulously. "Look, I don't like you, I'm sure I've made that more than clear. Dan is my best friend and you really hurt him. If it were up to me, you know, good riddance."

Blair's teeth sink into her tongue and she curls her hands at her sides. "And? What's your point?"

"Someone has to call you on your shit," Vanessa says. "I guess right now that's me."

"I can do that just fine myself."

Vanessa really pulls the disbelieving act better than anyone. "Oh really?"

"I _know_ , okay," Blair says, annoyed. "I'm not the Antichrist, I just fucked up."

Vanessa looks at her for a moment and Blair dares to believe she sees the suggestion of a smile on Vanessa's face.

"I'm trying to fix it," Blair says. "I gave up the spot."

Vanessa blinks, genuinely caught off guard, though she smothers it in a moment, her face calm and sarcastic once more. "I don't get it, but Dan really likes you. It's embarrassing. He's been moping nonstop. He tried to send you like fifty apology texts but he chickened out."

It's Blair's turn to be caught off guard. "Really?"

"He feels bad about what he said." Vanessa shrugs. "Even though it sounds totally deserved to me."

Blair rolls her eyes. "Yeah, I get it. As ever, V – your company has been a pleasure."

"V?" Vanessa tosses it off with half a smirk, finally continuing on her way to the café. "I'm the only one on today, Sundays are slow." She grabs an apron and holds it up. "Wanna lend a hand?"

Vanessa is lucky that Blair is wearing comfortable shoes. "I suppose I could," she says, reaching to snatch the apron. "Helping the needy is good karma, after all."

"And we both know you could use a lot of that," Vanessa says before moving off to go open the doors for the public.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blair had spent the weeks after cotillion trying to ignore Dan entirely. Now that she isn't trying anymore, it seems like he's everywhere.

She sees him coming up the steps every morning in his old beat-up green Army jacket, the one she'd tried to get him to throw out. She sees him through library windows, brow furrowed as he reads and reads and takes notes on top of notes. She sees him smile at something Nelly Yuki says and commands herself not to be jealous.

"You are totally crushing on my brother," Jenny says, sounding supremely pleased about it.

"Oh, hush, Little J," Blair huffs.

In between stalking Dan (as Jenny put it, because Blair would never say such a thing, and also that is _not at all_ what she's doing), she makes up with Iz. "Really, Blair," she says earnestly, eyes big, "I didn't know it was going to turn into a huge thing, I –"

"It's fine," Blair says, firmly, the kind of easy forgiveness she has never given. Under normal circumstances she would probably set up Iz's boyfriend with another girl and let Iz catch them in the act – or maybe some lowkey public humiliation would suffice. But the truth is she knows Iz didn't mean anything by it, and she knows Iz feels awful anyway. "I believe you."

Blair doesn't exactly credit Dan with _everything_ – she isn't really the type to pass off credit to anyone except herself. But she can't deny that he did help her; there are things she never would have done without his prodding, irritating at it was at the time. When she thinks of him, his words, his voice saying _I'm proud of you_ , she feels warm in a way she hasn't since Serena was still around. When Serena would be there to tell her _you can do it, B!_ with such absurd, charming authenticity that Blair couldn't help but believe her. Dan makes her feel something like that.

It's this realization that sends her straight to his locker at last bell. She gets there before he does so she waits, half-afraid he'll catch sight of her and leave, but she tries to remind herself of what Vanessa had said. _Dan really likes you. It's embarrassing_.

Blair knows something about embarrassing. She hung that stupid snowflake necklace on her vanity.

Dan freezes when he sees her, books in his arms, and then his face sets into a humorless expression. "Oh," he says. "It's you."

"That's some way to talk to a lady," Blair says. "I didn't teach you that."

Dan rolls his eyes and steps up besides her, jerking his locker open and beginning to stack his textbooks away. "Blair, if I wanted to see you –"

"You'd have sent one of those forty texts you composed?"

He sighs. "I should have taken Jenny for a traitor."

"Vanessa, actually."

Dan – very melodramatically, in Blair's opinion – rubs a hand over his face. "Turncoats everywhere."

Half a smile curls her lips. "So it would seem."

"It's just –" The locker closes between them with a clatter. The hall has emptied around them, and the sound echoes in the silence. "It's like you have no trust or faith in your own abilities. You would have probably kicked my ass if you'd just let your transcript stand for itself but no, you let insecurity get the best of you."

Her eyebrows arch. "And you let middle class superiority complex get the best of you."

" _Me_?" he says, aghast.

"Yes, you, Dan Humphrey, _you_ ," she says. "Face it: you're the judgiest person I've ever met outside of…well, myself, and you're certainly proud of it, and any puncture in that puffed up cloud of self-importance is apparently _staggering_ for you."

"I – You know –" Dan fumbles, then snaps, "That isn't the point."

"But it's true," Blair says coolly. "So don't pretend like I'm the only person with flaws. I'm sorry. I did what I could to make it right and I'm working on it. But I'm not the worst person on earth."

"I never said you were," Dan says, and it comes out too soft, devoid of anger.

"I am sorry," Blair repeats. "But I don't have any regrets either." And she curls a hand in his tie, dragging him down and into a hard kiss. His mouth opens against hers like he can't help it, like maybe he's been waiting for this as much as she has.

When she lets him go, he's confused. It's written all over his face. "No one's watching," he says.

Blair smiles. "I know."


End file.
